Posted
by
Soulskill
on Monday November 28, 2011 @02:12PM
from the subtract-those-ads dept.

redletterdave writes "The European Commission plans to put a stop to the way Facebook gathers information about its users, including their political opinions, religious beliefs, whereabouts and sexual preferences, and how the social network sells that information for commercial purposes. A new EC Directive aims to ban targeted advertising unless users specifically allow it, and to amend the current European data protection laws to ensure consistency in how offending sites are dealt with across the EU. If the European Commission has its way, Facebook would suffer big losses in advertising dollars that fund its site, which would further damage the company's plans to go public next year. Facebook has defended itself, claiming its advertisers target wide demographics like age and location, rather than specific individuals. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company denies outright that it misuses or mishandles user information."

Don't forget to block Facebook on your computer. Since every website that has a Facebook Like button or other widget loads that widget from Facebook. Facebook still knows many of the sites visited from your IP. Of course the same is true for Google widgets/ads and pretty much any widget.

NoScript is only a partial solution to that problem as you will find plenty of sites with iframes loading php from facebook. Requestpolicy might help or you can try to maintain a hosts file which blocks all the various hosts they use.

Or block all of Facebook's IP ranges on your router (if it has that ability). I added their known IPv4 ranges to the facebook page on Wikipedia on 3 September 2011, but that information was removed by "Gary King" on 8 October. For educational purposes, the IPv4 ranges were (as of 3 September 2011):
65.201.208.24 - 65.201.208.31
65.203.134.64 - 65.203.134.79
65.204.104.128 - 65.204.104.143
66.92.180.48 - 66.92.180.63
66.93.78.176 - 66.93.78.183
66.220.144.0 - 66.220.159.255
67.200.105.48 - 67.200.105.51
69.6

I'm all for this. I've been noticing ad's following me recently and it bothers me. For example the last few times I've been on/. the ads in the top right are reflecting places I have looked at on Newegg or Amazon. I would like to see this practice be curtailed and not just on facebook.

It's not just Facebook, many other companies like Google do this. But although this regulation has good intentions, like all attempts at regulating the Internet it will be counterproductive and unenforceable. The Internet is based on anarchy, that's what made it big and drives it today. Securing their data is the duty of the users.

So Amazon should shut down, as no one can be expected to keep their credit card details secure on the net. Of course there should be regulation to protect people. Large websites, such as Amazon, Google, Facebook, et al. all can easily be assessed for compliance, and once compliant, a large part of the internet has been made compliant. How a user is supposed to actually *use* the internet without providing any data to it is going to severely limit the uses of the internet. We'll end up with LOLcats all o

So Amazon should shut down, as no one can be expected to keep their credit card details secure on the net. Of course there should be regulation to protect people. Large websites, such as Amazon, Google, Facebook, et al. all can easily be assessed for compliance, and once compliant, a large part of the internet has been made compliant. How a user is supposed to actually *use* the internet without providing any data to it is going to severely limit the uses of the internet. We'll end up with LOLcats all over the place, and nothing of any actual use.

I don't think that the EU will forbid you to give your private data out voluntarily and for your own purposes. I believe the issue revolves around companies distributing your private data for their benefit and without your express permission.

Express permission means "opt in" not "opt out". Opt out is often difficult if not impossible, especially in the case of facebook. Also it is not something that many, if not most, users know that they can do.

Which would mean users have to enter their details every time they buy something; whereas what a lot of people like is the fact that they can do it once and not have to do it again until they change. The fact that I can just go to Amazon, hit 1-Click on the item I want, and it then turns up tomorrow is why I tend to buy stuff from Amazon if I can.

No, I'm not arguing that Facebook == the internet. However, if you're going to use the internet for anything other than getting docs, if you're going to use it for personal communication, then there has to be an element of trust with the entity that carries and stores your data.

Would you say, "don't use email" if a bunch of providers out there started making the contents of your email public? Or how about if your bank started to publish your account balance - wo

It's not necessarily about not using the Internet, but rather not using unreliable services, and letting the free market sort out the trash. But yeah, there are many examples for why it is stupid to trust your email service or online bank with sensitive data.

Would you say, "don't use email" if a bunch of providers out there started making the contents of your email public? Or how about if your bank started to publish your account balance - would it be your fault for having used on-line banking?

I would say "don't use email provider ", or "don't use bank ".

There are other social networking sites other than Facebook (dozens still current, hundreds been and gone). If people ditched companies that treated them badly, some of their competitors would eventually get big enough to topple them. Hell, Facebook did that to the likes of MySpace, and Twitter is arguably doing the same thing to Facebook now.

If the only social contact you have is through facebook I'd say that you're pretty anti-social already. Wall posts, messages, and facebook chat are not the same as a good face to face conversation. IE, hanging out.

I don't think you understand the power of data mining. Humans are very, very bad at performing inference on many variables. Computers are very, very good at it. It's true that people have a responsibility to safeguard their own privacy, but that's no reason we should have artificial intelligence programs scanning people's every online move to infer as much as possible about them. That's fucking scary, and it's scary that you don't think it's scary.

Just because a technical solution (may) exist doesn't mean we should solve a problem that way. Instead of laws against homicide, we could all just never leave our homes, or wear armor when we do. While this might seem empowering, it would make life suck.

While here in the US, those who most love to cite Orwell also tend to want there to be no limits to what corporations can do, even when it's the corporations (far more so than the government) that are filling the power niches.

What's more ironic is that Orwell was a socialist himself. Interpreting 1984 as an attack on socialism is a gross misunderstanding - one that's taught by many teachers in the U.S. It's an attack on totalitarianism. Fascism, for example, is a free-market totalitarian system. Oceania was socialist because it represented Soviet Communism, the good intentions of Lenin warped into the totalitarianism of Stalin. It's important to note that Emmanuel Goldstein represented Trotsky, an opponent of Stalin's totalitari

Totalitarianism is the result of the concentration of power. If this is at the hands of a socialist government, you get the USSR. If at the hands of a corporate state, you get Germany in 1938.

It's about balance. And those who oppose all government in the US (sometimes for good reasons) never seem to have another counterbalance to growing corporate power. Remember, the second part of the famous quote about "life, liberty and the pursuit of

WTF, do you not get the context? That was a section of a children's book that Winston was copying into his diary. The whole point is that the government were a bunch of fucking liars, starting with lying to children.

Except it's not ironic, because in a socialist state (as they've been expressed throughout history) the government would of course not allow a private company to accumulate and control all this personal data on individuals. That's a right solely reserved for the government.

Problem is, the end result of an unregulated free market is a monopoly, and without the counterbalance of government, corporations fill the role of government, and acquire the powers accorded to governments by the people. However, with this end result, there is no voting them out of office, and no one left to make laws to reign them in.

So, you're stuck with Apple then, since everybody else's computers have Windows preinstalled. And where are you getting your natural gas and electricity from? If you eat, you're doing business with Monsanto and ADM, even if you grow your own food. Cable TV? Well, your choices are Comcast, Dish, or an antenna.

What are you going to do when there are only three huge players in an industry you can't live without and they all behave in exactly the same

Google is an advertising company that happens to provide services that inspire people to see the ads that they sell.

Facebook is a data mining company that happens to provide services that inspire people to provide the data that they sell.

They both offer advertisements, the both do data mining. In many ways the companies are very very similar. The biggest difference is the interface that is presented to the public. They both offer most of their services in exchange for what they need to sell to make a living.

If you don't want to pay the price than don't take the service they offer. Or, just click the buttons to avoid telling the world about the things you'd rather the whole world not know.

I build electronic things and I tend to frequent places like mouser and digikey to order my parts. how shocked I was to see googleapis listed in in the bottom tray of firefox as something was loaded from google. I have ZERO desire for my stuff to touch google. I'm trying to build a project. its none of their fucking business. but what requests are going to google? and WHY?

more and more, I see google*this and google*that on varoius domains that my browser

That annoys me as well. Why the hell are people using off-site javascript files in their webpages for things that could just as well have been done locally? Just copy the bloody files, it's not like there are no decent free javascript libraries.

A lot of times its for updates. As the AC below mentioned, YUI allows off-site hosting or on-site. I tend to use the off-site because if they put out a bug fix then it's updated automatically and I don't have to re-download whatever is affected. Also licensing issues might prevent the script from being hosted locally.

If we extend your "if you don't like the price, don't use the service" advice to the real world, you will see that despite having far more choice in e.g. where to eat, where to shop, etc, there are even more laws governing business practices.

Just because people are free to take their business elsewhere doesn't mean businesses should be free to do whatever they like.

Only allow people to use their accounts if they agree to allow target advertisement... That would almost guarantee the majority will keep targeted advertisement over losing their accounts.

Anybody honestly believe such a law will have much effect on a site like facebook? This law would be more effective against sites where there isn't an incentive to keep an account. Of course, they could have a clause in the law that forbids such requiring permission to have an account but kinda doubt they thought of that.

Adblock+ [adblockplus.org] works perfectly well for facebook just like it does for most other sites. I suppose an opt-in system is better, but adblock covers pretty much all websites while this half measure covers only facebook.

Opting in would require you to install something to make adverts visable. And that would have to be something that the site doesn't tell you about, either (show me a website that says "Click here to install adblock+ and remove all adverts from our website"). You would have to want to see adverts badly enough that you would research of your own accord what piece of software would make it happen.

Maybe with the right list it will work, if so would you please tell us what list? The iframes to facebook php got past my browsers adblock plus and NoScript so dns seems the sanest way to cut them off at the knees,

Yes, they have alternate ways of tracking you and getting your information- but if you don't sign up for facebook you get more spare time, and less privacy stolen.

If you already are a member- quit now before you give away some other facet of your life.

Honestly- we all know how evil they are by now- so why do people keep using them? Is it really worth giving away every piece of information of your life just to play crappy games (that most slashdotters could write a better version of in an evening).

I use them mostly because anyone I want to talk to has moved away and that's the only way to get in touch. But also, as has been said on/. before, I have more control over my profile. Right now Facebook thinks I live in Timbuktu (it's pretty amusing to post something and see "near Timbuktu" on it), rather then being forced to use algorithms to determine where I am, which would probably be pretty accurate.

Also, remember to draw up a contract forcing your friends not to tag you. I hear that most unsigned people have a fairly comprehensive profile based on information provided by others. Not the same, but still

Let me guess... you answer is get rid of every friend that signed up for facebook (and live in a glorious cave)? Reality has to set in somewhere. I minimize my exposure to facebook by only allowing facebook to run java script when I want to use every once in a few weeks (

Yeah, I was buying cell-batteries the other day and the retailer wanted me to enter a facebook user and password so it could automatically insert a facebook comment that I had purchased batteries from them.

I remember thinking - WhyTF would I do that? Who on earth would want to post mundane information about what they buy online? IRS would looove to get a hold of their facebook profile no doubt.

No license or contract can legalize a crime. The only thing a facebook EULA can do is provide a set of terms the costumer needs to respect to receive the continued use of the product. The EULA can not take away any rights, and it can not give facebook any additional rights.

The press loves to get people all worked up about data mining. Data mining itself is not an invasion of privacy. At that point you are just an anonymous set of attributes. The purpose of data mining is to understand and discover the relationships that exist among different data. It's an analysis performed on a large body of data from a large population or it doesn't work. Your personal identity is not important or useful for its purpose. Targeted advertising isn't an invasion either even if it uses info

When rights are revokable, they are useless. "If you want our service, you must agree to give up all your rights to sue, your right to due process, and your right to privacy." Well, then they aren't rights. When you must "explicitly" give permission, they will just add a single splash page that people will click through to get the service, then they will do the "illegal" things as before. The only "cure" is the anti-libertarian solution of preventing that contract. The person can agree to the boilerpla

Is it good that so generic social networking site is run by an advertising company? Facebook's importance in people's lives has risen so high that maybe it should be run by some party with no financial interests. Or for humankind it should be recommended for everyone to move to something like Diaspora.

I'd rather have adverts that are targeted to my personal interests and 'likes' than be bombarded with irrelevant crap that I'm not at all interested in. Do I want to have farmville adverts showing up on my FB page? No - I'm not a teenage girl. Do I want to be notified when ebuyer or have a sale on? Yes. What's more relevant to me; A band I like is playing a concert in my area, or, A rapper who makes my ears bleed is doing a gig in a different country?

If they keep this up I might join you. The USA will probably make facebook accounts mandatory so the NSA can track us better.

Yes despite all the terrible press the EU gets especially in the UK, there are some nice things coming out of it like forcing mobile phone companies to all use mini-usb chargers. Sometimes I wish England would stop dicking about in EU and actually commit to something bigger than themselves for reasons other than personal greed.

You do realize the only reason the UK are doing fine today is because they took a lot of EU money a couple of years ago when they were in a crisis and the rest of Europe was not?There are 27 countries. Not everyone can benefit from it at the same time. The EU exists to regularize things between member countries, so that they can balance each other out. Sometimes a country is at the bottom of the balance, sometimes at the top.

Which is great until countries start actively gaming the system, spending wildly because "of course we'll get bailed out". A bit less cycnically, it's easy for a political leader to give money to the people, and wait on austerity until it's externally imposed, at which point it's not the leader's fault, it's those evil EU baddies. Which could all still work unless most of the countries happen to need a bailout all at the same time, which is pretty much where we are today - it's doubtful there's enough str

Care to back up that claim with anything? The 'only reason' the UK is fine is because it took a lot of money from the EU? We didn't take a lot of money from the EU, we are massively net contributors every year.

The UK has never defaulted on its debts and considering we invented the concept of a 'National Debt' that is saying something. There is no way we would give up that record easily as it saves us a couple of points on our interest payments in perpetuity.

Calling it a totalitarian state is an overstatement - for now, at least - but yeah, that seems mostly right. We (the Portuguese) are fucked too, yet sheepishly accept any and every imposition, despite being perfectly obvious that it just buries us faster.